Hemmings Find of the Day – 1984 Pontiac Fiero and other Indy pace cars

Do you happen to be building a collection of every Indianapolis 500 pace car edition, but you’re missing the 1979, 1980, and 1984 iterations? Or perhaps you really like both Fox-body Mustangs and Pontiacs that get no respect? If so, then don’t let the price attached to this 1984 Pontiac Fiero for sale on Hemmings.com fool you: It’s actually for a collection of original-owner Carter- and Reagan-era cars. From the seller’s description:

Attention Collectors: 1984 Pontiac Indy Fiero Pace Car with only 20,600 miles, Original owner and in show condition, 4-cyl, 5-speed and every option. This car comes as a package: 1979 Mustang Pace Car with 38,000 miles, 5.0 auto, show condition; a 1980 Turbo Trans Am Pace Car with only 17,000 miles, every option, in show condition; and a 1984 Mustang GT 350 20th Anniversary Edition convertible, 5.0, 5-speed with every option and only 7 miles, that is right, 7 miles; never been licensed or driven, this car is NEW. All cars are the same original owner and have been garage kept.

Ricksays:

April 20, 2011 10:51 am

Marksays:

November 1, 2013 7:57 pm

Are you one of those ignorant people who are still buying Toyotas when they’ve had more recalls & problems than any other auto manufacturer??? Wake UP! GM is back… and leaving the Toyota, Honda, and others in the dust.

Mal Fullersays:

April 20, 2011 11:53 am

casey shainsays:

April 20, 2011 12:25 pm

I’m flashing back to an electric blue, padded shoulder Eighties blazer I had when these Fieros were new. I prefer the last one made, ’88 right? I liked the roofline development and the V6. I think they’re all collectible. “Collectible” doesn’t have to always mean the fastest, or most expensive, or rarest, at least to me. Fieros were an interesting alternative with confusing marketing aimed at different segments. Commuter car as originally envisioned, or sports car?

Dave The Corvair Guysays:

April 20, 2011 12:52 pm

I have an ’86 Fiero SE with the V/6. I ordered the car new. I specifically skipped the sun roof because they had a nasty habit of leaking. I also stayed away from the dealer cut T-top, ala the Pontiac Firebird Trans Am.

I’m very happy with my Fiero. One of my boys wants to drive it and I have to tell him that he will have to get one of his own!

Chucksays:

April 20, 2011 5:44 pm

kevinsays:

April 21, 2011 2:31 am

How soon we forget, electrical fires, engines that would grenade due to bad connecting rods, and bean counters. The real pace car had a prototype quad 4 engine. The 2.5 that was the factory installed engine did not have enough guts to get to speeds of 130+ for Indy. Other notables about the Fiero, the front end suspension came from a Chevette, the back end from a Citation.

Ross W. Lovellsays:

May 20, 2011 11:47 am

Disclaimer: Have owned 4 of them both four and sixes and still have an ’84 manual 4-cylinder along with a last year Lotus-designed suspension car with a highly modifed V6.

If memory serves me correctly, the Indy Pace Car version was a turbocharged unit, at least that is what the BlueBook mentioned when I first found out there was one. At the time the six-cylinder was non-existant. Magazine articles mentioned the turbo was the only way to get the car to go fast enough to actually pace

The four wasn’t a bad car but could be a little gutless with the automatic.

The complaints about the Four’s lower end are surprising considering it’s the old Iron Duke derived powerplant.

Problems did exist. Early Fiero’s suffered froma lack of ventilation in the engine compartment. While the engine was fine the ancilliary components were not. I ran thermocouples to 4 different areas of the engine and found temperatures excessive.

The alternator’s thermocouple ran about 15 degrees hotter than Delco rated their armatures. The area by the sparkplugs was also problematic.

Plug wires on a Fiero were good for about a year before the wires would exhibit “corona”. Alternators were good for almost two years. Amazingly the early cars had no vents just panels. I purchased a later set of vented rear panels but had to remove the inner pressing for the venting to work.

Emergency brake cables tended to rust and cease to work. GM’s fix in Massachusetts was to only replace the cables on the manual as GM said you didn’t need an E-Brake on an automatic.

At the time I owned a four-cylinder manual and a six-cylinder automatic, imagine my surprise that both failed and GM was only responsible for fixing one of them. Another reason I hope Government Motors goes down the tubes.

The battery area stamping was another problem area which was later linked to the high heat causing the battery to cook and overflow.

Exterior was problem free and the interior wore like iron.

Like the automatic with the six better than the 5-speed Getrag that I still have. Several friends have fitted small and large V8’s but the clutch is the limiting factor even with high-tech kevlar based racing clutches.

They had a T-top version but it the chassis lacked stiffness.

The Lotus-designed suspension gave you less unsprung weight. Originally I thought the suspension looked a little to delicate and expected it to be a problem on the local roads which tend to be pretty coarse.

I thrashed that car and the suspension never failed. Getting a “wheel bearing assembly” was a little bit of an issue but it was managed.

The last engine that we fitted to my car was an Olds “Phantom” 4.1 liter that the heads had been modified to accept a Grand National intercooled Turbo intake. The Stock impelor was replaced witha ceramic unit and a pre/post oiler added. Getting tired of shifting, might change out to an automatic.

Seth Darvicksays:

August 24, 2017 7:56 pm

Ross,
Great info and stories about your cars. I myself have owned 4 Fieros begining with the ’85 Iron Duke I bought off the showroom floor. Of course it didn’t have enough power and didn’t want to bother with expensive mods (which the car would need a lot of). I eventually wound up with a stock ’86 V6. This provided a little more HP and was not a total embarassment, My ’71 TVR with a straight six smoked the Fiero. I wound up with a NOS set up which really gave my 3rd Fiero a lot of HP, but now that my TVR was modified with 3 Webers, headers and more–it still dusted the Fiero (and lots of other cars as well.) But, when I bought a brand new Twin Turbo Dodge Stealth–modified that too–was my thirst for speed finally started to calm down. I would recommend a Fiero that has had tasteful mods made to it i.e. a Fiero with a 3800 Super Charged engine. What a perfect relationship.

Thomas LaMarsays:

December 8, 2011 11:52 am

I am looking for the value of a highly modifed Indy fiero with Super duty 4 like the one that paced the Indy race.

I read your responce to the un-knowing, I have allways been a fan of this little car, just recently purchest one and I have got to say one of the most fun cars to drive I have owend. not the fastest but with a 70 MPH speed Limit, so what?

The racing history of the Iron Duke Is ausume, still going on today 29 years after the first Super Duty 4

If the Pontiac Engineers would have got there way we would have seen powerplant improvements that would have included Quad4 and DOHC V6 and the Corvette Killer boosted 3.8 V6 in this cute little car

This car was in no way without fault, the fires could have been averted by changing and placement of exhuast componets.

I have a 88 coup daily driver that has no problem crusing at 80+ and the scrap yards are full of replacement parts thanks to GM putting these motors in just about every thing made in the 80s

mnikesays:

May 31, 2012 9:31 pm

to clear up a few misconceptions mentioned above.
1) the real indy had an SD 4cyl with a carb no turbo . the 1.8 turbo was to go in but kept blowing up.
2) lotus never designed or built the suspension for the 88, that is an urban legend.
3) a stock 2.5 r code engine can be boosted to around 200 HP and hold together. most parts can come from the yard to do this.
the key is the connecting rods and a 3.0 crankshaft.